PHIL 150 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Homo Sapiens, Sentience, Fetus
Document Summary
Human" in the moral sense: a member of the moral community with full moral rights. Human" in the biological sense: a member of the species homo sapiens. To be a human in the moral sense a being needs some of these traits: sentience, reason, self-awareness, emotionality, the capacity to communicate, moral agency. Note that warren does not say a being must have all of these traits, only some to some degree. How much is unclear, but she thinks it is clear that a fetus definitely falls short. Well, because a dog or a pig has more of these traits than a fetus. If x is a person, then x must have most of the 6 traits: a fetus has none of these traits (or at least not enough), therefore, a fetus is not a person. If x is not a person, then it is morally permissible to kill x.
